Is this style category a typing error? We have a IIPA DIPA - Imperial category. And a DIPA is certainly not a NEIPA. So it makes sense for this category to just be Double Hazy (NEIPA).
I’d raise this in the admin forum, but I can’t find it.
This is SilkTork. I created this account because I couldn’t log in as SilkTork.
I’d forgotten that. And that explains why I couldn’t find the admin forum.
Seems normal for the sub categories:
IIPA DIPA - Imperial / Double IPA…Imperial IPAs
IIPA DIPA - Imperial / Double Hazy (NEIPA)…Imperial NEIPA
IPA…IPAs
IPA - Hazy (NEIPA)…NEIPA
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What about my old 78s?
The style names were introduced exactly 4 years ago, and were discussed then. Any gripes against them should have been brought up at that point. I wasn’t a fan of the formatting, but it was apparently done to make searching for them easier.
Also, keep in mind that you can always log in into your Silktork account on the forums by just resetting your Forums password - which is now separate from your RB password and doesn’t affect it. The instructions are in the pinned thread (as are instructions what to do if that doesn’t help).
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That’s one point of view. Another is that we can question how appropriate a certain situation is. That consensus can change. That we are a fluid, reflective and response community rather than something conservative and static. That we can continually evolve and develop.
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Sure, and we can change the styles classification if there’s enough support for that, however, as Shawn wrote, it kinda makes sense with the sub categories as is. As I’ve said, this was a compromise choice looking at what people type in trying to find styles and the classification that was pushed in general. I don’t like it visually, but meh, found no reason to go against it once it was pushed, as there were and are too many other things to take care of, making this extremely low priority. If you have a better general classification suggestion for the site, which includes style family grouping, go ahead, if there’s support, it can be changed I reckon.
Also, not sure how a DIPA cannot be a NEIPA as a Double New England IPA is certainly very much a thing. Got at least one in the fridge. Or are the brackets the thing that bothers you there? They do kinda imply that “NEIPA” is somehow the abbreviation for the style, and it’s not meant to be so but in rather “hazy or NEIPA”. We can get rid of those.
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I see a strong Hazy coming out of a Hazy rather than coming out of a DIPA.
We have IPA, out of that come several different variations, including the DIPA and the Hazy. The DIPA can get stronger, and the Hazy can get stronger. I don’t follow the logic that when the Hazy gets stronger, it jumps style back to DIPA, so it gets classed as a variation of a strong DIPA. If the Hazy is not classed as DIPA/Hazy why should the strong Hazy be classed as DIPA - Imperial / Double Hazy (NEIPA)?
I don’t even understand what you are currently arguing TBH as it doesn’t make sense to me.
Imperial beer is a beer that’s stronger than the original style and has a fuller body, more flavor, and higher alcohol content. The term “imperial” is often used interchangeably with “double” or “strong”. Anything that hits above normal IPA has always fallen into IIPA DIPA category it doesn’t matter if they put DIPA, TIPA, QIPA all of it is imperial past IPA. Hence it is only logical to have an Imperial / Double Hazy.
I believe these breweries might agree (from a quick google search):
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Yes, I can see that you misunderstand. That’s my fault for not explaining clearly.
I am perfectly happy with Imperial NEIPA, and all the examples you have shown.
What concerns me is the DIPA part. DIPA has been used to describe the West Coast IPA - a style of beer in which the hops are put in, as conventional, during the early or middle part of the process, but there’s a lot of hops. The resulting beer has an aggressive or assertive hop presence. That is its defining characteristic. Not just the amount of hops, but the assertive nature of them - the profound hoppy bitterness and hop burn.
The NEIPA or East Coast IPA also uses lots of hops, but puts them in very late, resulting in a softer, juicier, more fragrant hop presence. Very little or almost no bitterness. But plenty of hop fragrance and flavour.
Classing a strong or Imperial NEIPA as a DIPA seems to me to be conflating two beer styles. That is - two separate, indeed contrasting, styles are being used to define one style.
However, I hear what Marko is saying when he says this was done because users themselves were using the DIPA description to search for strong NEIPAs. Indeed, I’m aware that some brewers are using the DIPA description for strong hazy beers. Now, the question could be asked which came first - brewers describing a strong NEIPA as a DIPA, or RateBeer describing a strong NEIPA as a DIPA. Or perhaps - more likely - it was that font of all ignorance, the BJCP. Whatever it was, it seemed a typo mistake to me when I saw it. But Marko has explained that a discussion was held, and it was decided among those that took part in the discussion that DIPA NEIPA was the most useful way of categorising the beer. I accept that as a convenience - though I don’t accept that once a decision has been made it cannot be challenged or discussed. And I’m sorry that my post was so clearly misunderstood by yourself. It was not my intention to confuse you or anyone else. I assumed that, like Marko, people would understand what I was saying. I was looking at the the line of IPA → DIPA → Imperial/Triple DIPA versus IPA → NEIPA → Imperial/Triple NEIPA. Rather than IPA → NEIPA → DIPA Double/ Imperial NEIPA. Does that make sense?
Double IPA / DIPA has been universally used for hazies/NEIPAs for years, definitely before we did it (sadly, I think our influence on such trends, while it was certainly extremely bigger in the '00s and even the better part of the '10s than 99.9999% of the world’s beer geeks are aware, has waned in comparison to those days, due to various, largely obvious reasons).
I’ve literally had a gloopy, overly sweet “hype brewery” wheat & oats & estery yeast completely cloudy very much non bitter fruity modern hop beer that calls itself a “Double India Pale Ale” and nothing else on the can this Friday… Sometimes I do question my ticking whore habits, but thankfully wasn’t paying for it this time.
Anyway, the terms have become largely interchangeable, losing any such connotations for most brewers. It’s sometimes extremely silly how people avoid using the NE bit or even “Hazy” in descriptions and on packaging while intentionally making beers of that exact kind (not classic (D)IPAs that are “accidentally” and irrelevantly hazy).
I think I agree and certainly empathise with this post.
In the question of should we classify a beer as the brewer describes it or how we, RateBeer, feel it should be described for our purposes, I am firmly in the camp of we should classify it according to our own system. Otherwise we would be classifying Greene King IPA as an IPA rather than the session bitter it so obviously is.
